During the 1980s, American stages were swamped by musicals fromEngland. The danger of a similar invasion from Australia seems slight.

The most successful musical from Down Under ever, Priscilla Queen of the Desert, came to Broadway two years ago. The national tour arrived at the Dallas Summer Musicals on Tuesday. It’s a tawdry business.

Adapted from a cult movie, the show depicts three drag artists driving a bus – the title character – through the Outback, on their way from Sydney to a gig at a casino in Alice Springs. Tick, known onstage as Mitzi, harbors a couple of secrets: He’s married to a woman, and he has arranged the trip so he can meet the six-year-old son he has never seen.

Adam, known to his fans as Felicia, is a brash young risk-taker. Bernadette, a transsexual whose much younger husband has just died, goes on the journey to distract herself from grief. She encounters a surprising new romance along the way.

A flashback recalls an earlier era in which drag performers were known as female impersonators. Straight men and couples would get a frisson from the final revelation that the sexy dancers they had been admiring were actually men. The current crew, in contrast, puts on a surprisingly unthreatening show. The only performers who might inspire lust are the scantily clad male chorus members supporting them in Sydney.

The cast of Priscilla goes through hundreds of costumes that won all the big Broadway awards in 2011 but are elaborately hideous. The sets aim for glitz but manage only to be tacky. The score uses everything from disco hits to Madonna and Cyndi Lauper, with detours to Burt Bacharach and Jerome Kern. When the songs wedge themselves into dramatic scenes, the stretch to make the lyrics fit inspires giggles in the audience. And you’d think that a big, splashy show like this one would at least have fun dance numbers, but the choreography never rises above basic.

At first it seems that the acting is going to be as amateurish as the rest of the show. American actors, though, have become so deft that they almost can’t help turning in great performances. Wade McCollum, who played the Emcee in the DallasTheaterCenter’s Cabaret two seasons ago, actually manages to make us care about Tick’s anxiety over meeting his son. Scott Willis, the Radio City Rockettes’ Santa Claus, makes Bernadette a delicate creature without missing the big laughs.

Plan your life

Through May 26 at Fair Park Music Hall, 909 First Ave., Dallas. Runs 155 mins. $15 to $85. Ticketmaster.

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News, reviews, nuggets and tidbits from the local arts scene, including literature, theater, classical music, opera, dance and the visual arts.